It is this last one that inspires today's guest post by Diane Marrapodi, CSB. How easy it can be to let prayer slip into a wishing/wanting session. But as Diane says, "There’s more than a hot dog for you" in the prayer that seeks to know God as the Love that is loving you in very practical ways.

Radical Acts is ecumenical. All are invited, regardless of religious (or no religious) affiliation. Click any link in this post to take you into the Radical Acts pages of Time4Thinkers.com and learn more about the project.

For many years our sons were year-round swimmers, which meant we attended swim meets almost every weekend on some part of the east coast of the US. Through that activity we met many wonderful swimmers and their parents.

To this day I am very fond of Linda, a mom who constantly displayed a marvelous sense of humor. Midway through a swim meet she’d say to her terrific husband, “Bob, I’d really like a hot dog”. And with a regal wave of her hand she'd add, “Make it so." Bob, with a chuckle, always got up from the bleachers, went to the concession stand, and brought back a hot dog.

Every once in a while in the public practice of Christian Science I hear just such requests. Oh, not for hotdogs, of course, but for other things: entrance into a certain college; the desire for a specific spouse, house, move, job, - all for the purpose of getting something thought to be essential to happiness. But is the most efficient prayer really to tell God what we want and then to ask God, with a wave of our hand, to “make it so?"

Don’t we all remember a time when we prayed for something specific and didn’t receive it? Perhaps some time later we saw the folly of our request and the wisdom of not receiving that for which we asked. The best motive for going to God in prayer may not be so much to get something that we think will complete us, as it is to awaken to our nature as His beloved child and to His perfect plans for us.

Those verses remind me that while I can always pray “on the run” - in the car, at the grocery store - consecrated prayer also requires something more. We need to "go apart" sometimes, - maybe not physically, but certainly mentally, - to completely set aside the wishes and desires and cares clamoring for our attention - to be still and watch for fresh views of what God is doing for His creation. This devout prayer is not so much an asking as a listening and yielding to God who loves us and has our best interests at heart.

God is Love. (I John 4:8) Divine Love made you, knows you, loves you, and maintains your every step. Can you even now imagine the effect of going deep in prayer on this fact and keeping it before thought throughout the day? Why, it would comfort you, eliminate fear, enable you to see yourselves and others as the child of God, and open the door to abundant good. Harmony, peace, well-being is spiritually natural and normal. The prophet Isaiah said, “Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee: because he trusteth in thee.” (26:3)

Mary Baker Eddy’s Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures begins with a brief 17-page chapter entitled, “Prayer”. It opens with this very powerful statement, “The prayer that reforms the sinner and heals the sick is an absolute faith that all things are possible to God, — a spiritual understanding of Him, an unselfed love.” (1)

Further on she writes, “Look away from the body into Truth and Love, the Principle of all happiness, harmony, and immortality. Hold thought steadfastly to the enduring, the good, and the true, and you will bring these into your experience proportionably to their occupancy of your thoughts.” (261)

A prayer of absolute faith in what is possible to God and that springs from an understanding of God as Love, doesn’t involve wishing and wondering what you’ll get. It involves becoming aware and acknowledging the ever-present Love that is loving you, and Love’s will of divine good for you and for each one of His children.

Will there be results? Trust me on this. There’s more than a hot dog for you in this kind of prayer.

DianeMarrapodi is a Christian Science practitioner, teacher, and blogger. You will find this and more wonderful posts on her blog at DianeMarrapodi.com. Thank you, Diane, for helping us practice the radical act of seeking the Kingdom before all else!

Michelle Nanouche

6/26/2012 10:20:14 pm

i was just thinking about how Diane's post ties in with yesterday's post on Walking on Water, especially the link to Part 1 of the series. Did Peter step out of the boat because he wanted to defy laws of physics? Or because he wanted to go where Jesus was? What was he seeking first?

Dennis R.

6/27/2012 12:56:39 am

There have been times in my life when I did pray for something specific and received it. In these instances, I was just stretching my faith not lusting for something. The demonstrations were out of the blue and not necessarily from when I thought they would come.

Dennis R.

6/27/2012 04:29:04 am

Meant to say "Not necessarily where I thought they would come from."

Dennis R.

6/27/2012 04:28:05 am

Meant to say "Not necessarily where I thought they would come from>"

Bonnie

6/27/2012 09:14:38 am

I appreciate this posting today. Yesterday I had quite a conversation on this very topic with my 6-year old granddaughter. We needed to be at an appointment and her other grandmother was VERY late in arriving to care for the newborn sister. I had been working with the idea that all right ideas work harmoniously together as a rule for the kingdom of heaven and appreciating the fact that both grandmothers were sharing in this wonderful love for our granddaughters. In route to our appointment, I responded to my granddaughter's concern about our delay and potentially late arrival the ideas I had been working with and that God would take good care of us as we were doing good and loving the good being expressed by all. At our destination, when we arrived with 2 minutes to spare, she asked if God had actually changed all the stoplights to green for us! She was watching! It was a wonderful teaching opportunity to set straight that Love cares for our needs perfectly without manipulation of the human condition. And in fact, that the human condition adjusts to the divine Principle already in operation when we are doing good and loving our neighbor!

Kim

6/27/2012 12:41:44 pm

Diane - it is this kind of thinking that attracted me to Christian Science in the first place. Excellent, and more than a hot dog indeed.

I have practiced Christian Science professionally insome form since 1979.But my journey withChristian Science startedin a Sunday schoolwhere as a young childI was taught the Scriptures and some simple basicsof Jesus' method ofscientific Christian healing.A significant experienceat the age of twelveopened my eyes tothe great potentialof this practice. After impaling my footon a nail,I prayed the way I had learnedin Sunday school.Within momentsthe pain stoppedand healing began.By the next morning the wound had disappeared completely.Having experiencedthe great potential​of Christian Science,there would be noturning back.